Tuesday, April 22, 2014

The Many Sides Of Evidence:

This is a post by Mike Akaganglian

In today's thoughts, let’s have a look at what we actually call
evidence as opposed to what we should call evidence. First off there is
the big separation of what is anecdotal and what can actually be
examined as physical evidence. Anecdotal evidence is 90% plus of all the
reports that come into investigators, and is exactly that, anecdotal.
It doesn't solve anything really, and yes the stories can be fascinating
and compelling, and it's up to the investigator to in the end judge for
themselves how credible the anecdote is, or isn't. I have in my own
experience found myself second guessing first impressions of a report
more than once, in doubt of and in favor of. But that is the limitation
of Anecdotal stuff, it's in the end, a story. You either believe it or
you and there's nothing concrete to back it up. If it accomplishes
anything it simply reinforces the folklore. But then so does a good deal
of what's on the internet.

Then we move into the areas of gray,
audio, and the like. This is one that I suppose is open to debate
because audio gives you something to analyze and cross compare against
known suspects, but without a visual confirmation I don't personally
think it does more than raise questions, and is often misidentification.
Given the rates of blurry and suspect video and photo related evidence
this to falls short, it's simply too easy to manufacture the video, as
the current Standing situation demonstrates, or the Claws costume photo
before it.

Physical evidence is something we can touch, hair
samples, poo samples, dna samples from these and other sources, as well
as the track casts. As opposed to some wishful thinker casting a dent in
the mud, a "good" track cast assumes a mid tarsal break, which is in
and of itself an unproven theory and came from within the community, a
biased source. One could argue that there is or isn't a baseline
specimen to give as the justification of the midtarsal theory. That
basically leaves us with DNA itself, and even there for the moment you
have no baseline specimen that is a proven sasquatch, which also muddies
the waters. There have been two DNA studies, one pointed to a bear, the
other was conducted by a veterinarian whose findings, understanding of
the scientific process, among other things, haven't exactly helped the
cause.

For actual vettable evidence this is where things begin,
some sort of very compelling, uncontaminated dna, or god forbid an
actual body, living or otherwise. If it matters to you to have this
mystery finally embraced by mainstream science, then there will need to
be peer review from an unbiased source, and it will need to be that way.
The unfortunate flipside it will also have to run the gauntlet of all
of the bullshit that will have come before it.

Some out there
may have noticed that I overlooked those who think research is singing
kumbayah with the voices in your head, or drawing red circles around
tree stumps, and pointing at wind caused tree debri, fuzzy photos, and
claims of the fringe. Yes I did. Provide some compelling anything, and
maybe then you can play to, but until then, fraid not.